Thanksgiving is just around the corner. This was so good, I wanted to just eat it straight from the bowl. Warmed up perfectly. I am always strapped for time on Thanksgiving and doing anything ahead, is, well, gravy…I think I adapted this from My Italian Kitchen blog.

Ingredients

• 2 turkey thighs
• aromatics, garlic, carrot, onion, celery, sage, thyme
• 3 boxes of turkey stock or chicken, low sodium
• olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste

FOR THE GRAVY:

• one half cup plus probably a couple more tablespoons all purpose flour if you can find it, if not, regular all purpose flour would be fine also
• 1 stick butter, unsalted
• 1 or 2 teaspoons of Gravy Master or gravy Bouquet it should be found in the spice aisle. (optional)

Instructions:

Heat oven to 375.F place turkey thighs in a baking dish, not too deep, salt and pepper the parts and add aromatics like garlic, celery, onion and herbs.

Drizzle with olive oil and pour a little broth in the bottom of the pan.

Roast for maybe 1- 1½ hours or until nicely golden brown.

Transfer everything into a stock pot, all the veggies, turkey and every bit of those drippings.

Add enough stock to cover the parts, I added 2 boxes of turkey stock, but you can also use a mix with water or chicken stock. Don’t drown it just cover it, add in some salt and pepper.

Let it simmer slowly for around two hours partially covered, you’ll see the meat fall off all the bones and the veggies will be super soft and fall apart.

Let it cool down a bit then take a mesh strainer over a large bowl and throughly strain all the turkey and veggie contents, pressing down with the back of a spoon to help get all those tasty drippings into the bowl, take your time and let it all drip down.

Place strained broth/drippings into containers and refrigerate overnight so the fat can rise to the top.

MAKING THE GRAVY;

Skim the fat off the top of your broth before starting to make your gravy.

You’ll need two saucepans, one to warm up your broth so it’s not ice cold then a separate one you place the stick of butter into to melt.

When butter is melted whisk in ½ cup of flour, and keep whisking until it’s nice and golden about a minute or two, then pour the warm broth in and keep whisking until its thickened to your liking. I ended up putting 2 additional heaping tablespoons of flour into mine. In a separate small bowl I placed the additional flour and enough water to make a non lumpy consistency then poured and whisked it into my gravy mixture to make it thicker which I needed.

Taste for additional salt and peeper if needed.

At this point you can refrigerate the gravy into a container in the fridge a few days before Thanksgiving or just freeze it and take it out to defrost the day before Thanksgiving, either way just heat up and serve while the turkey is resting and being sliced. The fuss and mess will be done ahead of time for you and you’ll will be stress free at the crucial time before eating on the big day.